Trinity Co. authorities boast of success with new K9

October 14, 2013 at 9:52 PM CDT - Updated July 22 at 11:00 AM

GROVETON, TX (KTRE) - For the past month, the Trinity County Sheriff's Office has been fighting crime with its newest member.

"Ten times a day, I get phone calls this guys doing drugs, this guy has drugs, this guy is selling drugs," said Justin Sikes, the narcotics deputy. "It's just ongoing. You take one down and two more spring up. It's just an ongoing battle and with K9 Mundra it helps the battle a whole bunch."

And despite being only 19 months old, Mundra has already helped with 14 arrests, including catching one man who was found hiding inside an attic after he was caught violating his probation.

"We have a large drug problem here," said Sheriff Woody Wallace. "We've had it for years. Officers are trained to search vehicles but if you're talking about a small bag of methamphetamines that weighs less than a gram you can imagine the hiding spots in a vehicle and this dog pretty much can point it right out to us."

Mundra is not only able to find marijuana, but meth, heroin, and cocaine.

Duane Karn, a former Navy Seal, has been training with mundra for the past couple of weeks and says he's a natural.

"He's doing great," Karn said. "He's a great dog. He's going to be an asset for Trinity County."

Mundra has been practicing his bite work.

And for Mundra, these drills are the real thing.

<> "If you grab a hold of me, you know, he's trained to bite," Sikes said. "If you're fleeing from him, you know, that's on command, but that's the only time that he's trained to disobey my commands, if somebody hits me."